Can anyone tell me?

I'm not sure if this should go under hardware but here it is.... I have an older pc that I do not use and it just sits there collecting dust. I am wondering if it is possible to use it as an external memory source for the pc that i do use? If I can will you explain to me how to do it? Thank you for any information you can give me.

~Benk

 

You could take the hard drive from the old pc and put it in the current pc, but depending on how old the pc is, it might not have a very big drive.

Now if you're on about memory as in ram, then chances are that the memory used is a different type, probably sd ram as aposed to ddr.

 

I was thinking that I could take the hard drive from the old pc and add it to what is already in the newer one, but I wanted to get some advice from someone that would know for sure before I went messing with it.

The older computer is a Dell OptiPlex from 2000 and the newer one is an HP Pavilion 7850 which really isn't much newer than the Dell. I'm thinking that it is from 2001 or 2002. I bought the Dell for $50, but I don't really want to have it up and running to store files on, since I already have the Hp and a Dell Inspiron 600m notebook that I use continuously.

Now, if I do take the hard drive and put it in the newer computer how will I have access to it? Will the computer still boot with the existing hard drive and use the other as an accessible drive for me to store files on?

Thanks a ton for the help.

~Benk

 

I'll assume that we're dealing with an IDE drive, not S-ATA. Check out the page here. It'll give you some of the basics.

If you install the added drive as slave on the same IDE channel as your existing hard drive, and cable the added drive appropriately, it should not interfere with the boot process, and should be visible as the D: drive on your machine if it is formatted with a filesystem that your HP Pavilion's OS can read. (There's another assumption here: that you presently have only one primary partition in the Pavilion 7850. If not, the added drive will come up as some higher letter.)

As an alternative, you could install the added drive on the secondary IDE channel in your HP Pavilion. In that case, it shouldn't matter whether it is master or slave.

If the added drive is configured as slave on either channel, you'll need to be sure that the other drive on that channel is configured as master/slave present if necessary.

Your CD-ROM and/or DVD drives (if you have them in the HP Pavilion) will get bumped up by one letter. The OS assigns drive letters to them after all other drives/partitions have had letters assigned.

 

If the second hard drive is slower, then some controllers will default to the slower speed, or may not work altogether.

 

Also, before you even consider doing this, you need to open up your HP and verify that there is even room to put in the 2nd hard drive-- I know some smaller cases only hold 1 hard drive.

 

That's especially true in some brand name desktop cases.

My IBM NetVista case only takes one drive.